ESU rapper elevates her game tonight

However, when she takes the stage for the most important show of her fledgling career, it won't be in the City of Brotherly Love, but at the Sherman Theater in Stroudsburg tonight.

Her friends at East Stroudsburg University know her as Mia Waring, the former basketball player with a penchant for busting rhymes and, before that, throwing parties.

Standing 5-10, the former power forward will be one of the opening acts during the university's big spring show. The hotly anticipated Harlem rapper A$AP Rocky will be the main event.

Waring, who raps under the moniker LG, has performed at the Sherman before, but it took her two years of trying to get on the bill for the university's annual blowout.

To have her skills showcased at this show is a crowning achievement, and a long way from how she got her voice heard during her freshman year via hand-to-hand mix tape sales on campus and open mic events.

"It's going to be a huge crowd. I'm expecting support from my friends and my classmates," said the 22-year-old who is finishing up her senior year.

Waring has slowly created a buzz among her ESU peers. While earning a degree in media communication and technology, she's spent time in her dorm room making music on her laptop.

"I've been working underground in Philadelphia for 11 years now," she said.

When she started college, she began to compile her own mix tapes, or hip-hop music compilations, featuring her and her friends.

Her song "Party in my Dorm Room," was a modest local hit that she recorded for her "ESU College Mix tape Vol. 1." She sold several hundred copies around campus for $5.

For her, school is as important as sports or rapping.

"College has always been in my plans," Waring said. "I'm the first person in my family to go to college."

Waring grew up with three siblings in a one-parent household, shuffling around South Philadelphia, Germantown and North Philadelphia. Music, especially the kind with hip-hop beats, was a staple in her household. She was practicing her rapping from as early as 5, when her mother gave her lyrics to recite for a family reunion. The performer didn't begin to write her own raps until she was 9.

As she entered high school, basketball became her first love and she was a top player at Swenson Arts & Tech High School, scoring over 1,000 points in her career. Waring also won accolades for her skills in track and field. When it came time for college, a chance to continue to play was obvious.

"It was like NBA-status to me," she said about coming to ESU. She saw some action on the court her first year as a Warrior, but decided not to continue playing after her sophomore year. A change in coaching staff was what led her to leave the team. Despite a love for the game "differences" kept her from playing, she said. "Before I came, I was recruited by a different coach." Waring wouldn't elaborate. She scored a total of 213 points in her time with the team.

Still, it's putting words together and not a jump shot that may be her true calling. After her performance this week, Waring will be a part of the Urban Mountain Voices poetry event later this month in East Stroudsburg. For her, rapping is a kind of poetry. "It depends on who you ask," she said.